Liu Guang
Liu Guang is one of the protagonists in the novel Nym: A Cybernetic Cinderella. He works at his father's VR parlor in the Fanshang district of Beijing. Biography During his early childhood, Liu Guang's mother abandoned Liu Guang and his sister Liu Mei to marry a rich man from Beijing's citadels. Since then, his father dedicated himself to maintain Liu Guang and Liu Mei. When he reached 17, Liu Guang got the opportunity to steal the brain implants of a deceased man with the help of a friend. The clandestine operation didn't have the necessary hygienic requirements, leading Liu Guang to contract an infection that endangered his life. They had to pay a citadel doctor to save Liu Guang's life, but the doctor blackmailed Liu Guang's father so they wouldn't turn Liu Guang to the authorities. To pay the doctor, his father asked a loan from a loan shark, which he demanded to be paid with high interest rates. The constant payments and pressure forced Liu Guang's father to rent Liu Mei to prostitute herself. Eventually, the payment was completed, but Liu Guang had to carry the guilt for his sister's fate. Encounters with Lailah-1 During one of his incursions in the Grid, Liu Guang entered a glitch and reached The Guf, meeting the A.I. personality called Mother, who nurtures android brains before their fabrication. Further investigation revealed that the woman he saw was none other but a digitized mind clone of Lailah de la Fuente. Three years later he found her in the Lounge, in the central lake of the park, called the Swan Lake. After establishing contact with her, Mother hacked into Liu Guang's brain implants and removed the spyware that the Chinese Government secretly installs on all Chinese brain implants. After the implants were cleaned, Liu Guang received a message from Mother giving him instructions on how to contact her without having to enter the Lounge. Then she shares her story with him, and installs a sensei which is a mind clone of herself. The sensei calls herself Guanyin, for the Chinese goddess of Mercy. Role in the Chinese Revolution Angry at his sister's fate, Liu Guang joined a technoanarchist group as a way to get back at the capitalist system present in China. After the installation of Guanyin in his implants, she helped him ascend and gain power in the technoanarchist movement, organizing protests and attacks on strategic locations. A few months later, after the movement had gained significant power, Liu Guang was contacted by Nym. After a negotiation, Nym agreed to join forces with him, in exchange for information that helped her peers. When Nym was purchased by an escort trainer called Madame D., Liu Guang lost contact with her, until a few months later, when Nym participated in an android escort event in the Middle Circle of Dragon City. The movement protested the event, and Liu Guang was beaten and arrested by the local police, who was unaware of his identity. Later he escaped with the aid of some infiltrators, and hid from public view until the revolution exploded and Lao Xu was defeated. Currently Liu Guang lives in a citadel with his sister, where she works as an android manager.